


The Moral Value of Kittens

by misura



Category: White Collar
Genre: Community: WCPairings, Gen, Kittens
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-09
Updated: 2011-06-09
Packaged: 2017-10-23 06:01:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,798
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/247008
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/misura/pseuds/misura
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Wherein there is much ado about kittens.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Moral Value of Kittens

**Author's Note:**

> prompt: _kittens! lots and lots of kittens!_

"Bring your pet to work day," Neal says. There's a kitten sitting on his shoulder, and two more on his desk, staring at his hat, and Peter pettily hopes they'll jump on it.

"This is the FBI," Peter says.

Diana is very clearly not looking at them. Her body language declares she's not listening, either. Loudly. There's a saucer of milk standing on her desk.

Jones's chair is not empty. Peter thinks he did not join the FBI to fight against kittens. It's unfair, is what it is, and Neal is playing dirtier than usual.

"You can't bring kittens to the office," Peter says, aiming for calm, collected and reasonable. He's a good guy; he likes kittens. Saves them from trees if he needs to, and all that. "Neal, listen to me."

Neal puts on this expression that tells Peter that Neal would never not listen to Peter, and Peter remembers every single stupid thing he's ever said while Neal was around. There's not that many of them; Peter is not a stupid man. There's _some_ , though. He's human.

"My own place isn't big enough," Neal offers.

"You don't _have_ a place," Peter says automatically, nicely making Neal's point.

"Only for a week," Neal says, tone placating and soothing and not at all like he's proposing they turn the White Collar office into a playground for kittens for a whole week.

"Two days," Peter says quickly.

Diana turns her head, eyebrows raised. Peter feels like an idiot.

Neal puts on a neutral expression to make it clear how he's not gloating or smirking or doing anything else to inform Peter he's just been well and truly conned.

"Two days," Neal confirms and then, to add insult to injury: "Thanks, Peter."

 

"Could have been stolen art," Diana comments, her expression as neutral as Neal's when Peter drags her along for what's officially a coffee run.

"Could have arrested him for that," Peter replies wistfully.

He's not quite sure where Neal got the kittens yet, or what he's going to do with them two days from now. They're not working on any cases that involve cats, although they've been working on quite a few that involve mortgage fraud recently. Neal calls them 'boring'. Peter calls Neal calling them 'boring' whining. There's more boring things than mortgage fraud - like prison, for example.

"I've been thinking about getting a cat."

The elevator goes 'bing'. "Don't," Peter says.

 

Jones is shy about kittens. He vanishes for fifteen minutes, comes back with a piece of rope. The kittens swipe at it for a bit, but they don't actually seem to think it's interesting enough to give him his chair back. Diana vanishes to the bathroom. Peter tries to appreciate her discretion.

He's seen Jones tackle hardened criminals, some of them armed. _Most_ of them armed, and all of them dangerous. Jones is a solid man, a good agent. Peter would trust him at his back any time.

"Oh, come on." Peter steps up. The kittens blink at him curiously. Jones look half-grateful and half-embarrassed. "Just - " He reaches for the kittens. Kind but firm, that's the ticket - for dealing with consultants and kittens, both. Easy does it.

Or, as it turns out, not.

"Peter!" Neal actually looks alarmed. Peter would appreciate the change in expression more if he hadn't just been swiped at by a vicious ball of fluff.

"I'm fine," Peter says. It stings a bit, and he's going to have to put some disinfectant on, and if - no, _when_ Elizabeth hears about this (Neal is a terrible gossip), she's going to tease him about it for a week or so. "Let's just - "

"Reconvene in the conference room in five minutes? Got it," Diana says, already grabbing her files.

Jones glances at Peter, guilt written all over his face. "It's only a scratch," Peter says, because it is.

 

Hughes is less than pleased. Peter manages not to blurt out that he doesn't like it either, not one bit. He's agreed to give Neal two days; he's going to stick to it. You can cheat an honest man, but an honest man can't cheat back, not and _stay_ an honest man.

Peter is an honest man. "What does he think we run here? An animal shelter?" Hughes grumbles.

"Claims he found them abandoned in a cardboard box," Peter reports dutifully. He knows that Hughes isn't going to come down on Neal for this. He wonders if Neal knows saving kittens won't keep Hughes from coming down on him when he brings home anything less innocent than kittens - and then he wonders if he's ever going to be able to judge Neal's actions at face-value, and whether or not that's good thing. If it's possible to believe and trust and not get cheated when it comes to Neal.

"If it turns out they're worth money, make sure the Bureau gets it," Hughes says.

Peter doesn't think Neal would rescue kittens for money. "I don't think - "

"Make sure of it," Hughes says. "Run some inquiries. Those kittens didn't just appear out of thin air."

It's been a slow week. Not a lot of people would bother picking up a box of kittens, not even to drop them off at the animal shelter. It's not Peter's job to watch over kittens, but he did join the FBI for a reason, and it's not the salary.

 

When Peter picks Neal up the next day, there's only five kittens with him. Peter thinks it's probably not a good sign that he notices this right away, or that he can't keep quiet about it.

"Good morning," Neal says, smiling like he knows something Peter doesn't.

"What happened?" Peter has told Elizabeth they won't be adopting any of Neal's kittens. Firmly. Repeatedly. She smiled at him much like Neal does now.

Neal does that thing with his eyebrows he does when he feels Peter isn't meeting Neal's standards of appropriately polite and civilized behavior.

"Don't tell me you made June take one of them off your hands." Peter imagines telling June she can't be taking in a kitten when she wants to. A fun conversation, and likely fruitless.

"Mozzie," Neal says, sounding slightly put out.

"I thought you said he lived in a storage unit." Peter's not responsible for Neal's kittens. He's just ... concerned. He takes an interest.

"Middleman," Neal says, as if this should have been obvious. As if that single word actually explains anything. "He knows a guy who knows a guy who knows someone who wants a kitten."

"I'm not letting you lead these kittens into a life of crime," Peter says. "I'm warning you, Neal. I want a name - a real name, enough for a background check. And no more giving away kittens without having checked with me first."

Neal turns his face, but Peter knows what it means when his shoulders make that particular movement.

"I'm not joking."

Neal's eyes are bright with laughter when he looks at Peter. "I know."

 

Peter stares at the name Neal has obediently forked over. The two names, actually.

Neal grins at him. "Weren't you going to do a background check?"

"How does _Mozzie_ \- " Peter starts, before he realizes there are things he doesn't particularly want to know and this might be one of them. "Never mind. I thought they'd settled on a dog."

Neal shrugs. "You know what kids are like. Besides, always room for an extra pet. Not as if they haven't got anyone to help them take care of it. The Secret Service is quite competent - or so I've heard."

 

Hughes takes home a kitten for 'a certain young lady' and Peter doesn't ask, even though he feels Neal looking at him, daring him. Hughes isn't Mozzie.

Diana takes one for 'a friend'. Peter suspects she fully intends to keep it herself. It's tempting to blame Neal for corrupting his team, but Peter's a sensible man, and there's already a lot he blames Neal for.

Jones is a surprise, and in his case, Peter isn't sure whether or not to believe the story about a female relative.

It's quite satisfactory to have gotten a name and an address by lunchtime, someone Peter can get yell at without feeling like an ogre who doesn't like kittens or disapproves of other people rescuing them.

The stash of counterfeit money the guy happens to be keeping in his apartment is just a bonus, really.

 

"You _knew_ ," Peter says, not even sure himself whether he means for it to sound as an accusation or a 'thank you'. "You could have just told me." He's more sure about that one.

Neal looks away. "I'm a consultant, Peter. I'm not a fed."

Peter considers. Neal has never not helped them. On the case, at least, Peter has never had reason to doubt his loyalties. "So you - what? You did it for the kittens?" He tries to keep his tone light. They've just made an arrest, caught a bad guy red-handed. It's a good thing, a good day.

"He could have dropped them off at the animal shelter," Neal says.

There's two kittens left. They're cute - they're kittens.

Peter frowns as he pursues that line of thought, distracted for a moment from Neal and his peculiar code of honor among (ex-)criminals. "What about the mother?"

"What?" Neal asks, looking baffled.

"Kittens, cat," Peter says. "We didn't find a cat in the apartment, so where did it go?"

Neal's expression turns a little sulky. "He could have dropped them off at the shelter," he repeats.

Peter considers pressing the issue, imagines ending the day with Neal unhappy and Peter ... not as happy as he could have been, should have been. "Yes," he says at last. "I'm sure he could have."

"There's an animal shelter a few blocks from here," Neal says, almost not changing the subject.

Peter says nothing at all.

 

Elizabeth does not look surprised. In hindsight, Peter supposes he may have been less than convincing the evening before, when he assured her they would not be adopting any of Neal's kittens.

"I did tell Peter there was an animal shelter nearby," Neal says, sitting down on the couch after carefully putting down the kittens on the floor.

"Honey," Peter starts, because he's not the kind of man to make these sorts of decisions without discussing them with his wife first.

Satchmo wanders in, and Elizabeth makes a shushing gesture, and then another, more insistent one when Satchmo heads for the kittens and Neal half-rises.

For perhaps thirty seconds, the room is perfectly quiet.

"We're keeping them," Elizabeth tells Peter - or Neal, perhaps. "Satch likes them."

"I didn't know dogs could purr, too," Neal says, looking more relieved than anything else.

He's not the only one. Peter grins. "Lots of things you don't know."


End file.
